Posthumous Interests: Legal and Ethical Perspectives

by Daniel Sperling

• ISBN13: 9780521877848
• ISBN10: 0521877849
• Edition: 1st
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2008-06-08
• Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Summary

Daniel Sperling discusses the legal status of posthumous interests and their possible defeat by actions performed following the death of a person. The author first explores the following questions: Do the dead have interests and/or rights, the defeat of which may constitute harm? What does posthumous harm consist of and when does it occur, if at all? This is followed by a more detailed analysis of three categories of posthumous interests arising in the medico-legal context: the proprietary interest in the body of the deceased, the testamentary interest in determining the disposal of one's body after death and the interest in post-mortem medical confidentiality. Sperling concludes that if we acknowledge the interest in one's symbolic existence and legally protect it, not only do some interests survive a person's death but we should also enjoy a peremptory legal power to shape in advance our symbolic existence after death.

Table of Contents

Table of cases
Table of national provisions
Posthumous harm, posthumous interests and symbolic existence	p. 8
Harm	p. 9
Posthumous harm: the real puzzles	p. 15
Solving the problem of posthumous (non-)existence	p. 25
Persistent existence of the Human Subject	p. 34
Symbolic existence	p. 40
Posthumous rights	p. 49
Specific theories of posthumous rights	p. 53
General theories of rights	p. 63
Proprietary interest in the body of the deceased	p. 88
Is there a proprietary interest in the body of the deceased?	p. 89
Determining the disposal of one's body after death	p. 143
Constraints of autonomy interests	p. 145
Legal barriers to enforcing bodily testaments	p. 150
Alternatives to the will mechanism	p. 154
Alternatives to the property classification criterion	p. 165
Substantial limitations of enforcing bodily testaments	p. 171
Medical confidentiality after death	p. 186
Post-mortem confidentiality in ethics and law	p. 188
General justifications for confidentiality	p. 194
Practical solutions to breach of confidentiality	p. 212
Conclusions	p. 236
The application of the interest in the recognition of one's symbolic existence	p. 238
Possible objections to the idea of symbolic existence	p. 244
A right to the recognition of symbolic existence	p. 246
Select bibliography	p. 250
Index	p. 265
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